It is rare, nowadays, that a game gets me thinking. Deus Ex: Human Revolution is just a game. It is set in the not too distant future, in a world where science has made a leap forward in the augmentation of the human body. Amputees receive cybernetic limbs that function even better than the ones they lost. The blind can see again, and can even see through walls. The deaf can hear, but to the extent of eavesdropping on the conversation on the far side of a crowded room. In the world of Deus Ex the human body can be repaired from the brink of death, and the original improved upon.
That would be typical of us as a species. Why merely replace something, when it can be improved upon. It is one side of our nature, a need to explore the unknown and to uncover discoveries once thought to be impossible. We did not just develop a rocket that could reach the moon, we had to put a man on the lunar surface. We did not simply concur gravity, but created vehicles that can fly faster than the speed of sound. Human development will inextricably be tied to the development of our technology. From the discovery of fire to the iPhone, our entire society and way of life has been shaped and moulded by our technological development.
Naturally there are those that view such development with disdain and even outright scorn. The Amish eschew modern conveniences on religious grounds, things that most of us consider necessities. There are ‘tribes’ in Africa and South America that have been isolated from the rest of humanity for so long that our modern marvels seem to be far too mysterious and unnatural. In Deus Ex, it is the Purity First organisation. This is a dedicated anti-augmentation group that believes humanity is losing its essence by giving in to the temptation of improving on God’s work. Their position is strengthened by the fact that in order to ensure that implants to the human body are not rejected, recipients are forced to take anti-rejection drugs for the rest of their lives. Don’t take the drug and your body rejects the implants, and can even lead to a form of psychosis.
I know what you’re thinking, this a load of fantasy and pseudoscience. Then again, I wonder if Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry was thinking that one day people would be walking around with blue tooths (blue teeth?) stuck in their ears when he came up with the show’s futuristic handheld communicator? Remember those datapads they were always passing to each other, reminds me of the iPad I have to say. Science fiction has the sometimes unsettling ability to transform into science fact. Our computers are becoming smaller, and faster. How long before the first sub-dermal communication system, with GPS, is marketed as an acceptable ‘augmentation’? It will probably be called NEWear, or more than likely the iEar.
Will we stop there? Doubt it. We have cochlear implants already to give the deaf some semblance of hearing, Lasik to repair our eyes, and use plastic surgery to repair defects such as clubbed feet and cleft palates. We also use plastic surgery to ‘enhance’ other bodily attributes, and even change genders. One of the issues the Purity First organisation has in Deus Ex is that individuals without any medical problems opt for augmentations. Healthy limbs and organs are removed to give people an ‘edge’, and leads to more individuals becoming addicted to the anti-rejection drugs.We already have our so-called sports heroes doping themselves up, universities dedicated to grooming an intellectual and financial elite, and companies employing the most sophisticated technologies to monopolise markets. Will we be able to refuse the temptation to augment ourselves, especially if others are doing so? It will just become a game of keeping up with the cybernetic and augmented Joneses.
It has long been argued by theologians, scientists and philosophers that technology is to be the means by which humanity erases itself from history. This naturally conjures up images of global nuclear war, accidentally released biological or chemical weapons, or the destruction of our environment. However, Deux Ex offers us another possible way for humanity to become extinct. There is a possibility that humanity will disappear with a whimper rather than a bang. In the merging of man and machine we are likely to lose what we perceive to be our humanity, to evolve and transform into something else. As we use technology to eliminate aging, enhance our physical bodies, expand our intellects and mature psychologically, we will no longer be what we today define as ‘human’. Our hunter gatherer ancestors were certainly human, but their humanity was not comparable to ours. Similarly these augmented transhumans will view their humanity far differently than we view our own. It is not merely a philosophical transformation ala Nietzsche’s Übermensch, but a tangible, physical transformation. Is a person with more than fifty percent of their body augmented and artificially replaced still human, or are they something else? Is our humanity defined by our actions or what we are?
A final analogy, if you will. Consider the liger, a hybrid from the breeding of a lion and a tiger. It is neither tiger nor lion, but is both. It is rare, but now imagine that every lion bred with a tiger, until all we are left with is ligers. Do we then still refer to it as a cross-breed, a hybrid? Has it not become something entirely different if we can no longer refer to it in terms of its extinct ancestors? Humanity has the real possibility of one day facing this question. One day we might find ourselves so merged with our technology that it becomes difficult to define where the human begins and the machine ends. On that day we will have to admit that humanity (as we view it today) has been eradicated, and search for a new meaning to what it means to be.
